Endgame

Fans of games like Time Crisis and Point Blank don't have too much of a selection when it comes to finding like-minded productions; other than a few lackluster impersonators, a use for your Namco Guncon is kept at a minimum. Just imagine the heaping piles of joy then, shared by aspiring cops and gangster-wannabes when it was announced that Empire Interactive's next PlayStation 2 venture was a duck-and-cover light gun blaster. Somewhere deep inside, I was a little glad myself.

A very close impersonator of popular Namco titles, Endgame is a strange hybrid of reality and fiction. Taking place in both the real world and a virtual reality universe, the premise seems to be a mix between Hogan's Alley and the Michael Douglas/Demi Moore schlock-fest Disclosure. As a targeted heroine of undetermined background, you are being chased for unknown reasons by a gaggle of anonymous hitmen that have been hired by a mysterious super corporation. Needless to say, the plot likes to exploit being vague.

The playable we have appears to be near-finished, with the only changes we expect to see to come in the form of graphical and slight gameplay tune-ups. So far, the eye-candy is appropriately on par with its closer competitor Time Crisis 2, and other than the occasional pop-up and somewhat flat looking textures, does an acceptable job. Neat little features such as bullet holes left in walls from missed shots and damageable furniture add that extra bit of realism that discerning gun-nuts demand. FMV is the most obvious upgrade from our last disc; with none of the shimmering cinepak holes we had in that version anywhere to be found. Good news for these old sore eyes.

If anything Empire might want to tone the difficulty down a tad, as surviving through the first few missions is a tall order because of the accurate and powerful gunmen on the other end of the screen. Relentless with the eyes of an eagle, your female character is dead meat and fast if you slip up even slightly.

Of course that could be due to the lack of light blaster support in this rev. Despite multiple tries from multiple editors, none of us could seem to get the Guncon or Guncon 2 to work properly with the demo. Obviously a feature that will be fixed by the final burn, the fact that we were demoted to using only the Dual Shock as our tool seriously hindered our progress. By the time we get out shelf copy though, Endgame promises to support all sorts of third party peripherals.

On the plus side we could check out most of the features that are planned and were pleased with what we saw. Two entirely different modes (Endgame and Mighty Joe Jupiter) let you jump from serious to goofy in less than 2 seconds. While the Endgame mode allows you to play through the grown-up intrigue story line, Mighty Joe Jupiter pits you against Muppet-like aliens in a lighthearted romp through yesteryear (our personal favorite). Other goodies include training modes, fully customizable controls, and some other feature so secret that it crashed every time we accessed it (something about "The Trilogy").

Slated for release right around E3 time you can bet that we'll be back with more impressions shortly. If Empire can cut the loading times down (which in this beta, where admittedly god-awful) and give us a more balanced experience when using the controller, the chances of finding ourselves a sleeper increase by a factor of ten. Until next time!